


Too late

by Airspritegal



Series: Whelp, he ain't getting any deader. [2]
Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Character Death, Emotional pain, Gen, Geralt is emotionally dead, Geralt just finds out the hard way, Hurt No Comfort, Jaskier is dead, Jaskier | Dandelion Whump, Look this is just more angst, Post-Episode: S01E06 Rare Species, Well - Freeform, he will be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:42:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24192289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Airspritegal/pseuds/Airspritegal
Summary: Geralt takes the contact for the foglets to the west. What he sees in the bog has to be fake right? It just has to be!
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: Whelp, he ain't getting any deader. [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1746025
Comments: 25
Kudos: 209





	Too late

**Author's Note:**

  * For [InterPlanetary_Redacted](https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterPlanetary_Redacted/gifts), [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> Numerous people asked for a sequel to Why? And what am I but a simple woman who craves angst. For AceSpaceButterFace because they gave me the original prompt that inspired this sequel and InterPlanetaryGirl because they asked for the sequel itself.

Geralt knew the moment he screwed up irreversibly and he knew the moment he ruined his friendship with the bard. He knew right after the words left his mouth that he couldn’t take them back and found himself frozen in place as the bard left with a quiet goodbye. He heard him pause for only a moment before continuing on, the sour stench of betrayal left in his wake. 

Geralt lingered on the edge of the mountain for longer than he wanted to but the weight of what he said to Jaskier, and to a slightly lesser degree, what Yennefer had said to him, rooted him to the spot. He clenched his fists and finally turned as the day wore on, nearly to a close. Making his way down the path and back to their original camp was easy, and he didn’t want to linger too much on the fact Jaskier wasn’t camping there, waiting for him. The bard’s things were gone and he moved on quickly. He could do nothing but make his way down the mountain anyway, there wasn’t anything left on it for him. 

The first night he camped, at the old campsite, he could smell Jaskier’s trail lingering in the air, but with the headstart the other had, Geralt couldn’t catch up and he found himself camping alone, like he had done so many times before. The second night he fared no better, finding himself apparently just a few steps behind the bard. There were traces of him everywhere, his scent and lingering presence practically taunted Geralt, but the bard himself was nowhere to be found. He was forced to camp once more, despite how much he didn’t want to. Even a Witcher had to show some caution in barely known territory. 

Geralt reached Roach on the fourth day, some time late in the afternoon. He approached her and was a bit surprised when she stomped her hoof and shied away from him, as if she was mad at him. 

“Roach?” he muttered as she stomped again, pressing against his chest with more force than usual. Geralt frowned and moved around her, stopping short when he saw that his bags alone sat behind the mare, save for the extra bedroll he had given Jaskier long before. He looked back at the mare as she eyed him, as if making sure he’d seen what he’d done. 

“He was here already then?” he asked, and got no answer, as he expected. He saddled Roach and packed his things, and the extra bedroll, onto her back before climbing up and riding back towards town. When he reached it and after leaving roach in a nearby alleyway, he headed right away to the inn, asking after his bard. The innkeep shook her head and said that the bard hadn’t been back to the inn since the group had left days ago. Geralt thanked her quietly before he made his way out of the inn. 

No sooner had he set foot outside did a voice call out to him. A woman rushed to his side, her clothing filthy and torn, hair knotted. 

“Witcher! You’re the witcher! They said you would come back through soon!” she said and Geralt waited, silent, for her to continue.

“Please. The path to the west, to my home town is haunted by something. It kills travelers and tradesmen. Please, I managed to make it through by traveling nonstop. I brought our pay! Please, you have to help us.” she pleaded, holding up a bag that rattled with coins. 

"I need whatever details you can give me. " he said. 

"It starts at night. People camp in what they must think is safe. The only man to come home alive said they woke to a thick mist covering the area and voices calling to them. He said he heard his wife, dead ten years, calling to him. He saw her, in the mist, beckoning him. His mates were walking away by the time he got his wits about him. They vanished, he said, and he was so afraid he covered his head and lay there trembling to the sound of his wife, till morning came. As soon as the sun hit his face he scrambled up and home, leaving everything behind." She said, motioning to the westward path.

Geralt glanced the way she indicated, and sighed. “It sounds like Foglets…Stay here. I’ll return for the payment when the job is done. If I don’t come back you don’t pay.” he said and he saw the woman visibly relax. 

"Yes. Yes. Thank you." She said. 

Geralt grunted affirmatively as the woman turned and rushed into the inn he had just exited. He whistled and Roach came quickly around the corner to his side. He pulled himself up into the saddle and clicked his tongue quietly. Roach let out a huff before she started out of town, led west by Geralt's insistence. He wondered idly if Jaskier had headed west, and if he'd stayed safe.

He traveled for just a few hours, night encroaching on him quickly, before he pulled Roach to a stop, planning to camp for the night. He hopped down from the mare and patted her gently, allowing her to roam the area as she wished after he removed his things from her back. 

He set out his bedroll, though he didn't intend to sleep, and caught himself as he absently grabbed Jaskier's bedroll to lay out. The bard's scent was so strong that Geralt felt he could reach out and the bard would be close enough to touch. Had he come through here? 

He heard Roach whinny softly, as if nervous, and he turned to find her in the dark. The horse stood almost seventy yards away, huffing and nosing something on the ground. Geralt's eyebrows knit together in a barely there expression of worry. 

"Roach. What are you doing? Get back here!" He said as he stood. Roach neighed at him loudly and Geralt started towards her, curious. She rarely called his attention and never without reason. He stopped, frozen in his tracks as Jaskier's familiar floral scent hit him full force and he saw what Roach was nosing at. 

Jaskier's lute lay in its case, open to the elements and with no sign of Jaskier himself. A wrinkled bedroll and old fire pit hinted that someone, Jaskier, had been there but not recently. As Geralt stood, stock still, a thick fog began to roll in. It settled and Geralt reached for his silver sword. The foglets were nearby and he still had a contract to complete, and he planned to find the bard along the way. 

He turned towards the bog, watching, waiting. He expected anything from the creatures that waited just out of sight. He'd seen them take the form before of many things, a young boy, scared and alone, a shapeless mass that moved through the fog with little trouble. He almost dropped his sword as an all too familiar voice startled him from the darkness. 

"Geralt, is that you?" 

Jaskier sounded so close, as if he were just beside the Witcher. 

"Jaskier!?" He called. He saw movement in the fog and took a step towards it before he felt more than saw the rush of air as Jaskier rushed past him, chasing whatever it was he saw. Geralt reached out but was too late to catch the bard. 

He heard his own voice then, a ways into the bog.

"Jaskier? Where the hell did you go? You'll get yourself killed out here alone!" 

He saw Jaskier chase after the sound, seemingly unable to hear him as he called out. 

"Wait! Jaskier that's not…" he stopped. No, that couldn't be Jaskier, it was a foglet trick. Jaskier wouldn't have followed him without question like that. He had been so upset with the Witcher that Geralt was sure he would have simply told him to fuck off. The bard had probably fled when the apparitions became too much for him and would return in the morning.

He unsheathed his sword and stalked after the apparition. If nothing else he would kill the foglets and most likely find Jaskier in some hidden spot, too nervous to come out. He tried to ignore every instinct that pulled him forward when he heard the bard's voice let out a pained yelp. He heard Jaskier speak again, much further into the bog.

"Geralt! We meet again. I'll have you know I managed to set up camp all for myself! I'm not exactly unused to camping alone, Witcher. You should be proud of me! Especially after you so heartlessly sent me away."

Geralt clenched his teeth and waited, he waited for the vision to continue so he could pinpoint how many foglets and where exactly they were. A few moments passed before he heard,

"Geralt? Did you take a potion I don't know abo-" and a splash. A second later he heard a sharp intake of breath and his self control fled. He rushed into the heart of the bog and saw Jaskier sink beneath the churning water, eyes locked a figure in front of him. Standing across the water, on other stable ground, stood a close approximation of Geralt himself, watching with a patiently blank expression. 

"It's not real." He growled under his breath. He ignored the hand that shot just slightly out of the water, ignored the urge to grab the doublet sleeve and yank the bard to safety. This wasn't real, Jaskier wasn't there. The bard was hidden, safe; he had to be. 

Geralt growled as he flung himself across the space between him and his double. The facade melted away and he was quickly met with the ugly creature he expected. A second quickly raised itself from the water where he had seen Jaskier go under and lunged for him. 

He turned in a graceful move and plunged his sword through the chest of the creature that had looked like Jaskier. He was almost instantly facing the other and had plunged his sword through it as well before it had much time to do anything. 

When he pulled the sword out he let the body crumple to his feet and raised his eyes to make sure he wasn't wrong about how few there were. He saw something behind the fallen foglet and he started towards it with his sword at the ready. 

He bit back the sound of distress that threatened to escape from his throat as his gaze took in the limp form of the bard. Jaskier was laying on the ground, unmoving, eyes staring unseeing into the night sky. There were marks littering the skin of his arms and throat that hinted at foglet bites. It had to be yet another foglet, another trick, it had to be. 

As he approached he expected the creature to change, to lunge, to get up and fight, but it didn’t. The Jaskier look-alike laid there, unchanged. Geralt reached the illusion’s side before his fingers went slack and his sword fell to the ground with a sickening splash. It wasn’t an illusion, it wasn't a foglet trick. Jaskier himself lay there, pale and empty. 

A thick, choking sensation filled Geralt’s chest as his legs gave from beneath him. He fell into the mud on his knees, the scent of death overpowering his senses. He reached out but pulled his hand back as if burned when he felt the icy coldness of Jaskier’s cheek. 

“Jaskier…” he murmured. 

That hadn’t been a vision just to torture him then, he realized. That had been a replay of the last moments of his bard’s life. Jaskier had died with what he must have thought was Geralt simply watching him. He had followed what he thought was Geralt willingly and if the illusion was truthful, with few questions.

Why? Why!?

He lost track of time as he sat there, staring into Jaskier’s unseeing eyes. The sun rose and bathed him in light but he didn’t move; couldn’t move. 

He was too late.

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't the best but I actually rather like it.


End file.
